Yes, I would. Painting with a very broad brush... Pros of a younger doctor: More up to date on recent developments/research. Often more up to date on techniques/newer ways to do things. For a general medical person usually better at procedures since you often do them as a resident but not as much in practice. For a specialist that is not necessarily the case. Possibly more used to complicated medical cases as residents/fellows usually are in larger university hospitals where more complex cases go (that might not be true if your experienced doctor is part of a university or research hospital). Pros of an “experienced†doctor: For specialists may have more experience at procedures. More willing to go against the standard recommendations because they have heard recommendations come and go. More able to see patients as individuals because they’ve had more experience. More experience in dealing with things when they don’t go well. I know when I first got out of residency I was way better at things like sutures and other procedures than I would be now. I also was more up to date with whatever the current recommendations were. However, I also know that I treated people more by the textbook because the textbook was what I knew. Over time you learn that people don’t always follow the textbook.

I think what feels wrong is giving the emails to the school. That feels like an invasion of privacy. I would be more ok with a coach that asked each to contact 20 people personally to ask for donation. I don’t like mandatory fundraising anyway but if it is going to be done I think the kid needs to be the one doing it personally not just Hibbing the school a list of names.

I don’t know how to quote on my phone. I have the Zip like VaKim. I usually wear it on my waistband or sometimes on my bra. It seems to count most things accurately except cycling. I know someone who bikes a lot and puts it on their shoe if they are biking. Also, for people that want to count activities that their tracker might miss...you can go on the app or site and enter the activity you did manually. Some will convert to steps. I only do that if I forget to wear it and want the credit. I look at the Fitbit similar to the person who said it gives an idea of background movement. And I aim to more increase my activity rather than worry too much about a specific magica number.

I would tell him that if he wants to do the BOR that you will do what you can to make that happen. Whether that is volunteering or fighting the requirement that tge BOR is somehow tied to family service/fundraising. We do Scouts and I agree with pps that isn’t right...or the time he has to wait. I would also tell him that I think he might regret the decision to quit. Then I would let him decide. He might regret it but I think there is value in letting him decide.

Stacia’s post reminded me of another favorite of my kids...at the National Gallery of Art there is a “light installation†in the walkway between the East and West galleries. It’s a moving sidewalk inside a tunnel with lights that change. We used to ride back and forth like 20 times. I’m really bad at posting photos but here is a link to an old blog post that has a photo of it...along with some other DC field trip ideas. Scoll down to see the light tunnel photo. https://supratentorial.wordpress.com/2014/10/06/scenes-from-the-smithsonian/ I second (or third or fourth) going to Dulles Air and Space over the one on the mall...if you have a car. You can’t Metro there yet. One tip, I think parking is free there after 4 pm. It’s not that expensive before (I think $15 a car). It closes at 5:30 so it doesn’t give you a lot of time there, but if you time it right you can get in about 90 minutes free. And sometimes for kids that age, that’s all the attention they have anyway.

Natural History is our favorite and very kid-friendly. American Indian is a beautiful building and has a good kid’s room. Also good food. Not on the mall but my kids always loved the Building Museum. It’s not free, although you can go in the building itself without paying. It’s a HUGE space and my kids loved just running around in there. It’s a good option if you are looking for a place to burn off energy on a bad weather day. It’s not on the Mall but you can get there by Metro. There is a good kids’ play area (you have to pay to go in). And a really fun exhibit called Work Play Build (or something like that). Legos, huge foam building blocks.

Graphic novels are actually pretty cool. If they like them, there are lots of ones that you could offer them. We have ones of the Odyssey and Iliad, although they might be a too...graphic. ;) I found a lot of good suggestions from Farrar at I Capture the Rowhouse. Marcia Williams has the illustrated Shakespeare books that are really graphic novels. One thing I have done that has helped my kids to expand their reading horizons is to do required summer reading. I make a list of about 9-12 books and they have to read one a month from my list. They read a lot more than that but just the one per month from me. I try to make my list books that I think they will like but that they might not pick up on their own.

At that age I just let them read what they wanted. No assigned books. I picked books for read aloud and would get books I thought they would like out of the library and give it to them as an option. We do assigned reading more in middle school and up.

It’s very commonly known. We don't use it in pediatrics unless we truly have no other choice. And it’s not used widely anymore because of the tendon issues, unless it’s really the best choice for the infection.

We’ve done a variety of things. In general, we’ve gotten away from the 4 year history cycle. Oldest 5th Grade- Ancients using History Odyssey. 2nd grade brother was doing SOTW. Oldest 6th grade- We did a unit study year so no specific history. Oldest 7th grade- Year of world geography/culture with history and literature woven in- whole family did this. Resources were library books, documentaries, etc. No main “spineâ€. Oldest 8th grade- Year of Civics using We the People and some online resources. Younger kids were doing Early American History using a combination of the Maestro books, some chapters from SOTW, Hakim’s History of US and library books. Although in all honesty, I feel like it was the year of Hamilton (the musical)...it sparked an interest in history for the boys and they looked up so much on their own to learn more about things they heard about in the songs. Oldest 9th grade- Twentieth Century history with an American focus using Great Courses lectures and Gilbert’s A History of the Twentieth Century Middle son 5th grade- American history using Hakim’s A History of US and resources mentioned above. Middle son 6th grade this year...doing Twentieth Century American history using Hakim’s A History of US, daughter is also doing Twentieth Century American History using all the American Girl books from those decades. I think next year for the younger two we will go back to Ancients as my daughter kind of missed that. For my daughter we will use SOTW, even thought it’s a little young for a 4th grader. She hates history so my main goal with her is to convince her that it can be interesting and fun. For my middle son I’m not sure yet what we’ll use. I liked History Odyssey ok, but it’s a little dry and he’s a kid that needs it to be interesting.

Excellent, thanks. He is not ready for Math 2 yet. He’s finishing up AOPS Geometry so I’m not even sure he’d be ready for Math 1. I hadn’t really even had it on my radar until I went to the site to sign him up for the Chem Subject Test and started looking around and thought about the Math ones. I’ll shelve the Math one for a year or two.

Have your students who are interested in Math taken the SAT Subject Test? And is there any reason to take both Test 1 and Test 2?

I agree that she should be seen ASAP and I would do an MRI. Your family doc can order an MRI. The sticking point around here is that it can be hard to get one quickly if the kid needs sedation. At your daughter’s age, she might need sedation just because it’s hard for that age to hold still for a long time and it’s scary. But even then we can usually call and push to get one done soon if we think it needs to be. A CT is a quicker option because no sedation but it is not 100% for tumors. You can miss posterior fossa tumors on a CT. So a CT can help, but an MRI is preferable. I agree that if you cannot get your doc to see you earlier and order a test, then going into the ER is an option. Even if you don’t get a test done then, often they will set you up with a follow up appointment with a neurologist and that might be quicker than you would get on your own. But really this is something your doctor should do for you...order the test and call a new neurologist to get you her in ASAP. I would say also that it most likely is NOT a tumor...and there are lots of other tests I can think of doing. But the most crucial thing to rule out would be tumor or something structural and I would do that before thinking about testing for things like PANDAS.

:lol: I am seriously disappointed that I was a Biology major and never had a professor show that to us in class.

Dh went to Yale and always says that he felt like he didn't work very hard once he got there. The attitude was sort of "if you are here, you deserve to be here." He worked really hard in high school but then felt like college was fairly easy. That was of course about 1000 years ago, so maybe it's changed. I do know he has a bunch of friends from college whose kids are there now and have said the same thing about it now. He did say that you do have to be comfortable being around people who are elite...both financially, socially, academically, etc. He was from Indiana and a first-generation Chinese-American. The socioeconomic differences were much more of an issue for him than academics. He is now the most "unconcerned with other people" person I've ever met. In the sense that he really does not compare himself to others ever. That might be partially from personality and partially from the trial by fire of being put in a situation where he either felt inferior or just decided it didn't matter.

You can kind of do anything with chicken and the crockpot. Put chicken in, add some kind of sauce. Then make your sides separate. Budget Bytes has a good salsa verde chicken we make a lot. It’s basically chicken with a jar of salsa verde (and some other spices but those could probably be left off). You could use BBQ sauce or some other store bought sauce to make it super easy. One of my favorites is a curry with coconut milk. It’s basically chicken, coconut milk and spices or a good curry powder. Budget Bytes is probably my favorite recipe source, although she does also like one pot meals. But I find that her recipes are easy and almost uniformly good. I do meatloaf in the crockpot. I don’t have a specific recipe, but if you Google it you can find a bunch that are good. Meatballs are also good and can be used with pasta or for sandwiches. I make Lentil Tacos in the crockpot. It’s basically the filling and then you use it instead of meat in tacos.

For our first we both made lists separately. Then we compared lists and crossed off the ones that were no’s (veto power). I crossed off a lot more because he put things like Bono. Then we looked at the names that were on both lists. There were only three names for boys that were on both lists, if I remember correctly. We talked about those and there was a clear favorite that we both agreed on. For the other two, I thought of the names but he liked them. I would say we named them together, although technically the suggestions were initially mine. We had kind of the opposite problem from a lot of people. Dh has a very uncommon name. Everyone would recognize it but no one has it anymore. He loves having an uncommon name so he really wanted the kid’s names to be similarly uncommon. We didn’t totally succeed at that, especially with our daughter. But it automatically ruled out a lot of names.

We haven’t done that book but do use AOPS. We’ve done Pre-Algebra, Intro Algebra, Intro C&P and now are in Geometry. I don’t consider that I teach it at all. It seems designed to be self-taught and I think that’s why it works so well for the right kind of kid (not meaning a kid who is necessarily super smart but one who learns in a particular way). Ds does it all pretty much on his own. I check his work and then have him go back over problems he missed. If he can’t figure out why, I’ll get out the solutions guide and try and help him. If I can’t, I usually find that if I read him the first sentence or two of the solution he will realize how to do the rest. I then have him read the solutions guide himself to see how they did it. Almost always he figures it out with minimal assistance from me. I love AOPS and consider myself ok in Math. I did a lot of Math in school, but didn’t love it. I’ve developed more of an appreciation for hard Math doing Singapore and then AOPS with my kids. But I’d find it really hard to have a kid who did AOPS without a class who wasn’t a kid who did well self-teaching.

I have a blog that is fairly inactive. I used to post more photos when the kids were younger. In general on the blog I was careful about the stories I told and the photos I posted. I tried to be conscious about how the kids might feel about what I wrote or said. So something general was fine...but not specifics and I was careful not to complain about kids. I mostly wrote about books so it wasn’t a big issue. As the kids got older I posted less photos. I have Instagram now. My oldest hates having his photo taken so I am careful about not posting photos of him that show his face. I post occasional photos of the other two who are the kind of kids that would probably become kid YouTubers if I would let them. I still try and be careful about what I post as far as not posting anything that would embarrass them. I didn’t vote on the poll as I didn’t really feel like any of the choices apply. I would say “Yes, but I try and be cautious of what they want and are ok with.†I’m not that worried about safety for what I post. But I do want to make sure I don’t post things that they don’t want posted.

Not really a foodie book, but one I enjoyed before our trip to Paris two years ago was The Only Street in Paris by Elaine Sciolino. I didn’t love The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie when I read it. Flavia was too quirky for me or something. But then I tried again a few years later with the next books in the series and really liked them. Sometime it’s just right book, wrong time. I think the title comes from a quote..."Unless some sweetness at the bottom lie, who cares for all the crinkling of the pie.†The book says it’s by William King from "The Art of Cookeryâ€, written in 1709. I think it’s saying that it doesn’t matter how something looks on the outside, it’s what’s inside that matters. I went away this weekend to a hotel alone for my annual birthday “reading retreatâ€. I read three books and caught up on my stack of New Yorkers. I finished Pachinko by MIn Jin Lee. I also read Augustown by Kei Miller. The interesting thing about reading them both was that they both underlined to me how much of the world I am ignorant of. Pachinko is all about Koreans living in Japan. I had no idea of the attitude of the Japanese towards Koreans in their country or the complexities of those relationships. And Augustown was a similar experience. I also read The Screwtape Letters, which I am having my son read for school. Last week I also read The Saturdays by Elizabeth Enright for my daughter’s book club. It’s one of my favorites from childhood so was a super fun re-read. Up next....Admissions by Henry Marsh (British neurosurgeon). I also was given Kristen Hannah’s new book The Great Alone for my birthday so that’s on the stack as well as Rethinking School. And I just remembered after reading this thread that my book club meets Friday night and we’re reading A Portrait of a Lady. It’s a fairly recent re-read for me so I think I’ll likely just skim it since I have so many other things I want to read.

Swim team is pretty much our summer. Dd will also do dive team. Our pool has a fun water-polo team which the boys did last year and loved. Ds wants to work for the first time at the pool this summer and also hope to help coach (he’s been volunteering over the winter and really likes it). Oldest will go to NAYLE which is a Boy Scout leadership thing. Other two will go to camp for a week. Daughter will do a very cheap fun ballet camp that is run by high school girls that are friends of ours. We don't do a lot of school but they will all do a little math, music practice and read a lot.

Lentil tacos

The things that have led to the best relationships for my kids are things where they are working on some kind of shared project together in a group. Having the project or planned activity helped give the group focus and also led to commitment in terms of getting together. It also seems to be best if it’s something that is year-long rather than seasonal. Odyssey of the Mind was fabulous for my boys. We did it for several years with the same team and it gave them a once a week meeting time. They also had free time with that so had time to just hang out. Scouts has also served the same purpose, to some degree. It’s been really good for my oldest. Partially that is because some of the same kids from our OM team and co-op are in the Scout troop so he already had those relationships and then adding Scouts in just gave them extra time together. My middle son enjoys Scouts but it’s been harder for him to form relationships with kids his own age there. He does hang out with his brothers’ friends and is slowly forming a few other friendships. At our co-op, the kids involved in drama and speech seem to bond in the same way. They are working on something together and then have fun while they do it. I ended up starting a book club for my daughter because she needed more social time with her friends. That has also been really great.

We just talked about it as a family. It’s stuff we talk about anyway but we made a point of doing it at a dedicated time to check off that box.

It’s a bad year. We are seeing 10-12 cases a day of flu (test positive) in our office. I don’t know our exact numbers in past years but it’s definitely more than usual. We’re also seeing other respiratory viruses as well but the kids with the flu are by far sicker. It’s fairly easy for us to guess who will test positive just by looking at them when they come in. We are seeing about 75% Influenza A and 25% Influenza B. The people with B are not nearly as sick. The kids with A are miserable. We have had a handful of patients hospitalized but all have been mostly for observation and have recovered, thankfully.